[Illustration] The Winds of Time He contracted for a charter trip--but the man who hired his spacer wasn't quite a man, it turned out--and he wanted more than service! by James H. Schmitz Illustrated by Brotman Gefty Rammer came along the narrow passages between the _Silver Queen's_control compartment and the staterooms, trying to exchange the haggardlook on his face for one of competent self-assurance. There was nothingto gain by letting his two passengers suspect that during the past fewminutes their pilot, the owner of Rammer Spacelines, had been a barestep away from plain and fancy gibbering. He opened the door to Mr. Maulbow's stateroom and went inside. Mr. Maulbow, face very pale, eyes closed, lay on his back on the couch, still unconscious. He'd been knocked out when some unknown forcessuddenly started batting the _Silver Queen's_ turnip-shape around as the_Queen_ had never been batted before in her eighteen years ofspacefaring. Kerim Ruse, Maulbow's secretary, knelt beside her employer, checking his pulse. She looked anxiously up at Gefty. "What did you find out?" she asked in a voice that was not very steady. Gefty shrugged. "Nothing definite as yet. The ship hasn't beendamaged--she's a tough tub. That's one good point. Otherwise ... Well, Iclimbed into a suit and took a look out the escape hatch. And I saw thesame thing there that the screens show. Whatever that is. " "You've no idea then of what's happened to us, or where we are?" MissRuse persisted. She was a rather small girl with large, beautiful grayeyes and thick blue-black hair. At the moment, she was barefoot and in asleeping outfit which consisted of something soft wrapped around hertop, soft and floppy trousers below. The black hair was tousled and shelooked around fifteen. She'd been asleep in her stateroom when somethingsmacked the _Queen_, and she was sensible enough then not to climb outof the bunk's safety field until the ship finally stopped shuddering andbucking about. That made her the only one of the three persons aboardwho had collected no bruises. She was scared, of course, but taking thesituation very well. Gefty said carefully, "There're a number of possibilities. It's obviousthat the _Queen_ has been knocked out of normspace, and it may take sometime to find out how to get her back there. But the main thing is thatthe ship's intact. So far, it doesn't look too bad. " Miss Ruse seemed somewhat reassured. Gefty could hardly have said thesame for himself. He was a qualified normspace and subspace pilot. Hehad put in a hitch with the Federation Navy, and for the past eightyears he'd been ferrying his own two ships about the Hub and notinfrequently beyond the Federation's space territories, but he had neverheard of a situation like this. What he saw in the viewscreens when theship steadied enough to let him pick himself off the instrument roomfloor, and again, a few minutes later and with much more immediacy, fromthe escape hatch, made no sense--seemed simply to have no meaning. Thepressure meters said there was a vacuum outside the _Queen's_ skin. That vacuum was dark, even pitch-black but here and there camemomentary suggestions of vague light and color. Occasional pinpricks ofbrightness showed and were gone. And there had been one startlingphenomenon like a distant, giant explosion, a sudden pallid glare in thedark, which appeared far ahead of the _Queen_ and, for the instant itremained in sight, seemed to be rushing directly towards them. It hadgiven Gefty the feeling that the ship itself was plowing at high speedthrough this eerie medium. But he had cut the _Queen's_ drives to themerest idling pulse as soon as he staggered back to the control consoleand got his first look at the screens, so it must have been the lightthat had moved. But such details were best not discussed with a passenger. Kerim Rusewould be arriving at enough disquieting speculations on her own; theless he told her, the better. There was the matter of the ship'slocation instruments. The only set Gefty had been able to obtain anyreading on were the direction indicators. And what they appeared toindicate was that the _Silver Queen_ was turning on a new headingsomething like twenty times a second. Gefty asked, "Has Mr. Maulbow shown any signs of waking up?" Kerim shook her head. "His breathing and pulse seem all right, and thatbump on his head doesn't look really bad, but he hasn't moved at all. Can you think of anything else we might do for him, Gefty?" "Not at the moment, " Gefty said. "He hasn't broken any bones. We'll seehow he feels when he comes out of it. " He was wondering about Mr. Maulbow and the fact that this charter had showed some unusual featuresfrom the beginning. Kerim was a friendly sort of girl; they'd got to calling each other bytheir first names within a day or two after the trip started. But afterthat, she seemed to be avoiding him; and Gefty guessed that Maulbow hadspoken to her, probably to make sure that Kerim didn't let any of heremployer's secrets slip out. Maulbow himself was as aloof and taciturn a client as Rammer Spacelinesever had picked up. A lean, blond character of indeterminate age, withpale eyes, hard mouth. Why he had selected a bulky semifreighter likethe _Queen_ for a mineralogical survey jaunt to a lifeless little sunsystem far beyond the outposts of civilization was a point he didn'tdiscuss. Gefty, needing the charter money, had restrained his curiosity. If Maulbow wanted only a pilot and preferred to do all the rest of thework himself, that was certainly Maulbow's affair. And if he happened tobe up to something illegal--though it was difficult to imaginewhat--Customs would nail him when they got back to the Hub. But those facts looked a little different now. * * * Gefty scratched his chin, inquired, "Do you happen to know where Mr. Maulbow keeps the keys to the storage vault?" Kerim looked startled. "Why, no! I couldn't permit you to take the keysanyway while he ... While he's unconscious! You know that. " Gefty grunted. "Any idea of what he has locked up in the vault?" "You shouldn't ask me--" Her eyes widened. "Why, that couldn't possiblyhave anything to do with what's happened!" He might, Gefty thought, have reassured her a little too much. He said, "I wouldn't know. But I don't want to just sit here and wonder about ituntil Maulbow wakes up. Until we're back in normspace, we'd better notmiss any bets. Because one thing's sure--if this has happened to anybodyelse, they didn't turn up again to report it. You see?" Kerim apparently did. She went pale, then said hesitantly, "Well ... Thesealed cases Mr. Maulbow brought out from the Hub with him had some veryexpensive instruments in them. That's all I know. He's always trusted menot to pry into his business any more than my secretarial dutiesrequired, and of course I haven't. " "You don't know then what it was he brought up from that moon a fewhours ago--those two big cases he stowed away in the vault?" "No, I don't, Gefty. You see, he hasn't told me what the purpose of thistrip is. I only know that it's a matter of great importance to him. "Kerim paused, added, "From the careful manner Mr. Maulbow handled thecases with the cranes, I had the impression that whatever was insidethem must be quite heavy. " "I noticed that, " Gefty said. It wasn't much help. "Well, I'll tell_you_ something now, " he went on. "I let your boss keep both sets ofkeys to the storage vault because he insisted on it when he signed thecharter. What I didn't tell him was that I could make up a duplicate setany time in around half an hour. " "Oh! Have you--?" "Not yet. But I intend to take a look at what Mr. Maulbow's got in thatvault now, with or without his consent. You'd better run along and getdressed while I take him up to the instrument room. " "Why move him?" Kerim asked. "The instrument room's got an overall safety field. I've turned it onnow, and if something starts banging us around again, the room will bethe safest place on the ship. I'll bring his personal luggage up too, and you can start looking through it for the keys. You may find thembefore I get a new set made. Or he may wake up and tell us where theyare. " Kerim Ruse gave her employer a dubious glance, then nodded, said, "Iimagine you're right, Gefty, " and pattered hurriedly out of thestateroom. A few minutes later, she arrived, fully dressed, in theinstrument room. Gefty looked around from the table-shelf where he hadlaid out his tools, and said, "He hasn't stirred. His suitcases are overthere. I've unlocked them. " Kerim gazed at what showed in the screens about the control console andshivered slightly. She said, "I was thinking, Gefty ... Isn't theresomething they call Space Three?" [Illustration] "Sure. Pseudospace. But that isn't where we are. There're somespecial-built Navy tubs that can operate in that stuff if they don'tstay too long. A ship like the _Queen_ ... Well, you and I andeverything else in here would be frozen solid by now if we'd got suckedsomehow into Space Three. " "I see, " Kerim said uncomfortably. Gefty heard her move over to thesuitcases. After a moment, she asked, "What do the vault keys looklike?" "You can't miss them if he's just thrown them in there. They're over sixinches long. What kind of a guy is this Maulbow? A scientist?" "I couldn't say, Gefty. He's never referred to himself as a scientist. I've had this job a year and a half. Mr. Maulbow is a very considerateemployer ... One of the nicest men I've known, really. But it was simplyunderstood that I should ask no questions about the business beyond whatI actually needed to know for my work. " "What's the business called?" "Maulbow Engineering. " "Big help, " Gefty observed, somewhat sourly. "Those instruments hebrought along ... He build those himself?" "No, but I think he designed some of them--probably most of them. Thecompanies he had doing the actual work appeared to have a terrible timegetting everything exactly the way Mr. Maulbow wanted it--There'snothing that looks like a set of keys in those first two suitcases, Gefty. " "Well, " Gefty said, "if you don't find them in the others, you mightstart thumping around to see if he's got secret compartments in hisluggage somewhere. " "I do wish, " Kerim Ruse said uneasily, "that Mr. Maulbow would regainconsciousness. It seems so ... So underhanded to be doing these thingsbehind his back!" Gefty grunted noncommittally. He wasn't at all certain by now that hewanted his secretive client to wake up before he'd checked on thecontents of the _Queen's_ storage vault. * * * * * Fifteen minutes later, Gefty Rammer was climbing down to the storagedeck in the _Queen's_ broad stern, the newly fashioned set of vault keysclanking heavily in his coat pocket. Kerim had remained with heremployer who was getting back his color but still hadn't opened hiseyes. She hadn't found the original keys. Gefty wasn't sure she'd triedtoo hard, though she seemed to realize the seriousness of the situationnow. But her loyalty to Mr. Maulbow could make no further difference, and she probably felt more comfortable for it. Lights went on automatically in the wide passage leading from the cargolock to the vault as Gefty turned into it. His steps echoed between thesteel bulkheads on either side. He paused a moment before the bigcircular vault doors, listening to the purr of the _Queen's_ idlingengines in the next compartment. The familiar sound was somehowreassuring. He inserted the first key, turned it over twice, drew it outagain and pressed one of the buttons in the control panel beside thedoor. The heavy slab of steel moved sideways with a soft, hissing sound, vanished into the wall. Gefty slid the other key into the lock of theinner door. A few seconds later, the vault entrance lay open before him. He stood still again, wrinkling his nose. The area ahead was only dimlyilluminated--the shaking-up the _Queen_ had undergone had disturbed thelighting system here. And what was that odor? Rather sharp, unpleasant;it might have been spilled ammonia. Gefty stepped through the door intothe wide, short entrance passage beyond it, turned to the right andpeered about in the semidarkness of the vault. Two great steel cases--the ones Maulbow had taken down to an airlessmoon surface, loaded up with something and brought back to the_Queen_--were jammed awkwardly into a corner, in a manner whichsuggested they'd slid into it when the ship was being knocked around. One of them was open and appeared to be empty. Gefty wasn't sure of theother. In the dimness beside them lay the loose coils of some verythick, dark cable--And standing near the center of the floor was a thingthat at once riveted his attention on it completely. He sucked hisbreath in softly, feeling chilled. He realized he hadn't really believed his own hunch. But, of course, ifit hadn't been an unheard-of outside force that plucked the _Queen_ outof normspace and threw her into this elsewhere, then it must besomething Maulbow had put on board. And that something had to be amachine of some kind-- It was. About it he could make out a thin gleaming of wires--a jury-riggedsafety field. Within the flimsy-looking protective cage was a doublebank of instruments, some of them alive with the flicker and glow oflights. Those must be the very expensive and difficult-to-build itemsMaulbow had brought out from the Hub. Beside them stood the machine, squat and ponderous. In the vague light, it looked misshaped anddiscolored. A piece of equipment that had taken a bad beating of somekind. But it was functioning. As he stared, intermittent bursts ofclicking noises rose from it, like the staccato of irregular gunfire. For a moment, questions raced in disorder through his mind. What was it?Why had it been on that moon? Part of another ship, wrecked now ... Aship that had been at home _here_? Was it some sort of drive? Maulbow must know. He'd known enough to design the instruments requiredto bring the battered monster back to life. On the other hand, he hadnot foreseen in all detail what could happen once the thing was inoperation, because the _Queen's_ sudden buck-jumping act had surprisedhim and knocked him out. The first step, in any event, was to get Maulbow awake now. To tamperwith a device like this, before learning as much as one could about it, would be lunatic foolhardiness. It looked like too good a bet that thenext serious mistake made by anybody would finish them all-- Perhaps it was only because Gefty's nerves were on edge that he grewaware at that point in his reflections of two minor signals from hissenses. One was that the smell of ammonia, which he had almost stoppednoticing, was becoming appreciably stronger. The other was the faintestof sounds--a whispering suggestion of motion somewhere behind him. Buthere in the storage vault nothing should have moved, and Gefty's muscleswere tensing as his head came around. Almost in the same instant, heflung himself wildly to one side, stumbling and regaining his balance assomething big and dark slapped heavily down on the floor at the pointwhere he had stood. Then he was darting up through the entrance passage, turning, and knocking down the lock switches on the outside door panel. It came flowing around the corner of the passage behind him as the vaultdoors began to slide together. He was aware mainly of swift, smooth, oiling motion like that of a big snake; then, for a fraction of asecond, a strip of brighter light from the outside passage showed along, heavy wedge of a head, a green metal-glint of staring eyes. The doors closed silently into their frames and locked. The thing wasinside. But it was almost a minute then before Gefty could control hisshaking legs enough to start moving back towards the main deck. In thehalf-dark of the vault, it had looked like a big coiled cable lying nextto the packing cases. Like Maulbow, it might have been battered aroundand knocked out during the recent disturbance; and when it recovered, ithad found Gefty in the vault with it. But it might also have been awakeall the while, waiting cunningly until Gefty's attention seemed fixedelsewhere before launching its attack. It was big enough to haveflattened him and smashed every bone in his body if the stroke hadlanded. Some kind of guard animal--a snakelike watchdog? What other connectioncould it have with the mystery machine? Perhaps Maulbow had intended toleave it confined in one of the cases, and it had broken loose-- Too many questions by now, Gefty thought. But Maulbow had the answers. * * * * * He was hurrying up the main deck's central passage when Maulbow's voiceaddressed him sharply from a door he'd just passed. "Stop right there, Rammer! Don't dare to move! I--" The voice ended on a note of surprise. Gefty's reaction had not been toorational, but it was prompt. Maulbow's tone and phrasing implied he wasarmed. Gefty wasn't, but he kept a gun in the instrument room foremergencies. He'd been through a whole series of unnerving experiences, winding up with being shagged out of his storage vault by something thatstank of ammonia and looked like a giant snake. To have one of the_Queen's_ passengers order him to stand where he was topped it off. Every other consideration was swept aside by a great urge to get hishands on his gun. He glanced back, saw Maulbow coming out of the half-opened door, something like a twenty-inch, thin, white rod in one hand. Then Geftywent bounding on along the passage, hunched forward and zigzagging fromwall to wall to give Maulbow--if the thing he held was a weapon and heactually intended to use it--as small and erratic a target as possible. Maulbow shouted angrily behind him. Then, as Gefty came up to the nextcross-passage, a line of white fire seared through the air across hisshoulders and smashed off the passage wall. With that, he was around the corner, and boiling mad. He had no greatliking for gunfire, but it didn't shake him like the silently attackingbeast in the dark storage had done. He reached the deserted instrumentroom not many seconds later, had his gun out and cocked, and was facedback towards the passage by which he had entered. Maulbow, if he hadpursued without hesitation, should be arriving by now. But the passagestayed quiet. Gefty couldn't see into it from where he stood. He waited, trying to steady his breathing, wondering where Kerim Ruse was and whathad got into Maulbow. After a moment, without taking his eyes from thepassage entrance, he reached into the wall closet from which he hadtaken the gun and fished out another souvenir of his active servicedays, a thin-bladed knife in a slip-sheath. Gefty worked the fasteningsof the sheath over his left wrist and up his forearm under his coat, tested the release to make sure it was functioning, and shook his coatsleeve back into place. The passage was still quiet. Gefty moved softly over to one of thechairs, took a small cushion from it and pitched it out in front of theentrance. There was a hiss. The cushion turned in midair into a puff of brightwhite fire. Gefty aimed his gun high at the far passage wall just beyondthe entrance and pulled the trigger. It was a projectile gun. He heardthe slug screech off the slick plastic bulkhead and go slamming down thepassage. Somebody out there made a startled, incoherent noise. But notthe kind of a noise a man makes when he's just been hit. "If you come in here armed, " Gefty called, "I'll blow your head off. Want to stop this nonsense now?" There was a moment's silence. Then Maulbow's voice replied shakily fromthe passage. He seemed to be standing about twenty feet back from theroom. "If you'll end your thoughtless attempts at interference, Rammer, " hesaid, "there will be no trouble. " He was speaking with the restraint ofa man who is in a state of cold fury. "You're endangering us all. Youmust realize that you have no understanding of what you are doing. " Well, the last could be true enough. "We'll talk about it, " Gefty saidwithout friendliness. "I haven't done anything yet, but I'm not justhanding the ship over to you. And what have you done with Miss Ruse?" Maulbow hesitated again. "She's in the map room, " he said then. "I ... It was necessary to restrict her movements for a while. But you might aswell let her out now. We must reach an agreement without loss of time. " Gefty glanced over his shoulder at the small closed door of the maproom. There was no lock on the door, and he had heard no sound frominside; this might be some trick. But it wouldn't take long to find out. He backed up to the wall, pushed the door open and looked inside. Kerim was there, sitting on a chair in one corner of the tiny room. Thereason she hadn't made any noise became clear. She and the chair werecovered by a rather closely fitting sack of transparent, glisteningfabric. She stared out through it despairingly at Gefty, her lips movingurgently. But no sound came from the sack. Gefty called angrily, "Maulbow--" "Don't excite yourself, Rammer. " There was a suggestion of what might becontempt in Maulbow's tone now. "The girl hasn't been harmed. She canbreathe easily through the restrainer. And you can remove it by pullingat the material from outside. " Gefty's mouth tightened. "I'll keep my gun on the passage while I doit--" Maulbow didn't answer. Gefty edged back into the map room, tentativelygrasped the transparent stuff above Kerim's shoulder. To his surprise, it parted like wet tissue. He pulled sharply, and in a moment Kerim camepeeling herself out of it, her face tear-stained, working desperatelywith hands, elbows and shoulders. "Gefty, " she gasped, "he ... Mr. Maulbow--" "He's out in the passage there, " Gefty said. "He can hear you. " Hisglance shifted for an instant to the wall where a second of theshroudlike transparencies was hanging. And who could that have beenintended for, he thought, but Gefty Rammer? He added, "We've had alittle trouble. " "Oh!" She looked out of the room towards the passage, then at the gun inGefty's hand, then up at his face. "Maulbow, " Gefty went on, speaking distinctly enough to make sureMaulbow heard, "has a gun, too. He'll stay there in the passage andwe'll stay in the instrument room until we agree on what should be done. He's responsible for what's happened and seems to know where we are. " He looked at Kerim's frightened eyes, dropped his voice to a whisper. "Don't let this worry you too much. I haven't found out just what he'sup to, but so far his tricks have pretty much backfired. He was countingon taking us both by surprise, for one thing. That didn't work, so nowhe'd like us to co-operate. " "Are you going to?" Gefty shrugged. "Depends on what he has in mind. I'm just interested ingetting us out of this alive. Let's hear what Maulbow has to say--" * * * * * Some minutes later Gefty was trying to decide whether it was taking aworse risk to believe what Maulbow said than to keep things stalled onthe chance that he was lying. Kerim Ruse, perched stiffly erect on the edge of a chair, eyes big andround, face almost colorless, apparently believed Maulbow and waswishing she didn't. There was, of course, some supporting evidence ... Primarily the improbable appearance of their surroundings. Thepencil-thin fire-spouter and the sleazy-looking "restrainer" had asufficiently unfamiliar air to go with Maulbow's story; but as far asGefty knew, either of them could have been manufactured in the Hub. Then there was the janandra--the big, snakish thing in the storage whichMaulbow had brought back up from the moon along with the batteredmachine. It had been, he said, his shipboard companion on anothervoyage. It wasn't ordinarily aggressive--Gefty's sudden appearance inthe vault must have startled it into making an attack. It was notexactly a pet. There was a psychological relationship between it andMaulbow which Maulbow would not attempt to explain because Gefty andKerim would be unable to grasp its significance. The janandra wasessential, in this unexplained manner, to his well-being. That item was almost curious enough to seem to substantiate his otherstatements; but it didn't really prove anything. The only point Geftydidn't question in the least was that they were in a bad spot whichmight be getting worse rapidly. His gaze shifted back to the screens. What he saw out there, surrounding the ship, was, according to Maulbow, an illusion of space created by the time flow in which they were moving. Also according to Maulbow, there was a race of the future, human inappearance, with machines to sail the current of time through theuniverse--to run and tack with the winds of time, dipping in and out ofthe normspace of distant periods and galaxies as they chose. Maulbow, one of the explorers, had met disaster a million light-years from thehome of his kind, centuries behind them, his vehicle wrecked on anairless moon with damaged control unit and shattered instruments. He hadmade his way to a human civilization to obtain the equipment he needed, and returned at last with the _Silver Queen_ to where the time-sailerlay buried. Gefty's lip curled. No, he wasn't buying all that just yet--but ifMaulbow was _not_ lying, then the unseen stars were racing past, themass of the galaxy beginning to slide by, eventually to be lost foreverbeyond a black distance no space drive could span. The matter simply hadto be settled quickly. But Maulbow was also strained and impatient, andif his impatience could be increased a little more, he might starttelling the things that really mattered, the things Gefty had to know. Gefty asked slowly, as if hesitant to commit himself, "Why did you bringus along?" The voice from the passage snapped, "Because my resources were nearlyexhausted, Rammer! I couldn't obtain a new ship. Therefore I charteredyours; and you came with it. As for Miss Ruse--in spite of everyprecaution, my activities may have aroused suspicion and curiosity amongyour people. When I disappeared, Miss Ruse might have been questioned. Icouldn't risk being followed to the wreck of the sailer, so I took herwith me. And what does that mean against what I have offered you? Thegreatest adventure--followed, I give you my solemn word, by a safereturn to your own place and time, and the most generous compensationsfor any inconvenience you may have suffered!" Kerim, looking up at Gefty, shook her head violently. Gefty said, "Wefind it difficult to take you on trust now, Maulbow. Why do you want toget into the instrument room?" Maulbow was silent for some seconds. Then he said, "As I told you, thisship would not have been buffeted about during the moments of transferif the control unit were operating with complete efficiency. Certainadjustments will have to be made in the unit, and this should be donepromptly. " * * * "Where do the ship instruments come in?" Gefty asked. "I can determine the nature of the problem from them. When I was ... Stranded ... The unit was seriously damaged. My recent repairs werenecessarily hasty. I--" [Illustration] "What caused the crack-up?" Maulbow said, tone taut with impatience, "Certain sections of the GreatCurrent are infested with dangerous forces. I shall not attempt todescribe them ... " "I wouldn't get it?" "I don't pretend to understand them very well myself, Rammer. They arenot life but show characteristics of life--even of intelligent life. Ifyou can imagine radiant energy being capable of conscious hostility.... " There was a chill at the back of Gefty's neck. "A big, fast-movinglight?" "Yes!" Sharp concern showed suddenly in the voice from the passage. "You... When did you see that?" Gefty glanced at the screens. "Twice since you've been talking. Andonce before--immediately after we got tumbled around. " "Then we can waste no more time, Rammer. Those forces are sensitive tothe fluctuations of the control unit. If they were close enough to beseen, they're aware the ship is here. They were attempting to locateit. " "What could they do?" Maulbow said, "A single attack was enough to put the control unit out ofoperation in my sailer. The Great Current then rejected us instantly. Aship of this size might afford more protection, which is the reason Ichose it. But if the control unit is not adjusted immediately to enableit to take us out of this section, the attacks will continue until theship--and we--have been destroyed. " Gefty drew a deep breath. "There's another solution to that problem, Maulbow. Miss Ruse and I prefer it. And if you meant what you said--thatyou'd see to it we got back eventually--you shouldn't object either. " The voice asked sharply, "What do you mean?" Gefty said, "Shut the control unit off. From what you were saying, thatthrows us automatically back into normspace, while we're still closeenough to the Hub. You'll find plenty of people there who'll stake youto a trip to the future if they can go along and are convinced they'llreturn. Miss Ruse and I don't happen to be that adventurous. " There was silence from the passage. Gefty added, "Take your time to makeup your mind about it, if you want to. I don't like the idea of thoselights hitting us, but neither do you. And I think I can wait this outas well as you can.... " The silence stretched out. Presently Gefty said, "If you do accept, slide that fire-shooting device of yours into the room before you showup. We don't want accidents. " He paused again. Kerim was chewing her lips, hands clenched into smallfists in her lap. Then Maulbow answered, voice flat and expressionlessnow. "The worst thing we can do at present, " he said, "is to prolong adispute about possible courses of action. If I disarm, will you layaside your gun?" "Yes. " "Then I accept your conditions, disappointing as they are. " He was silent. After a moment, Gefty heard the white rod clatter lightlyalong the floor of the passage. It struck the passage wall, spun off it, and rolled into the instrument room, coming to rest a few feet away fromhim. Gefty hesitated, picked it up and laid it on the wall table. Heplaced his own gun beside it, moved a dozen steps away. Kerim's eyesfollowed him anxiously. "Gefty, " she whispered, "he might ... " Gefty looked at her, formed the words "It's all right" with his mouthand called, "Guns have been put aside, Maulbow. Come on in, and let'skeep it peaceable. " He waited, arms hanging loosely at his side, heart beating heavily, asquick footsteps came up the passage. Maulbow appeared in the entrance, glanced at Gefty and Kerim, then about the room. His gaze rested for amoment on the wall table, shifted back to Gefty. Maulbow came on intothe room, turning towards Gefty, mouth twisting. He said softly, "It is not our practice, Rammer, to share the secrets ofthe Great Current with other races. I hadn't foreseen that you mightbecome a dangerous nuisance. But now--" His right hand began to lift, half closed about some small goldeninstrument. Gefty's left arm moved back and quickly forwards. The service knife slid out of its sheath and up from his palm as anarrow of smoky blackness burst from the thing in Maulbow's hand. Theblackness came racing with a thin, snarling noise across the floortowards Gefty's feet. The knife flashed above it, turning, and stoodhilt-deep in Maulbow's chest. * * * * * Gefty returned a few minutes later from the forward cabin which servedas the _Queen's_ sick bay, and said to Kerim, "He's still alive, thoughI don't know why. He may even recover. He's full of anesthetic, and thatshould keep him quiet till we're back in normspace. Then I'll see whatwe can do for him. " Kerim had lost some of her white, shocked look while he was gone. "Youknew he would try to kill you?" she asked shakily. "Suspected he had it in mind--he gave in too quick. But I thought I'dhave a chance to take any gadget he was hiding away from him first. Iwas wrong about that. Now we'd better move fast ... " He switched the emergency check panel back on, glanced over the familiarpatterns of lights and numbers. A few minor damage spots were indicated, but the ship was still fully operational. One minor damage spot whichdid not appear on the panel was now to be found in the instrument roomitself, in the corner on which the door of the map room opened. Thedoor, the adjoining bulkheads and section of flooring were scarred, blackened, and as assortedly malodorous as burned things tend to become. That was where Gefty had stood when Maulbow entered the room, and if hehad remained there an instant after letting go of the knife, he wouldhave been in very much worse condition than the essentially fireprooffurnishings. Both Maulbow's weapons--the white rod lying innocently on the wall tableand the round, golden device which had dropped from his hand spittingdarts of smoking blackness--had blasted unnervingly away into that areafor almost thirty seconds after Maulbow was down and twisting about onthe floor. Then he went limp and the firing instantly stopped. Apparently, Maulbow's control of them had ended as he lostconsciousness. It seemed fortunate that the sick bay cabin's emergency treatmentaccessories, gentle as their action was, might have been designed forthe specific purpose of keeping the most violent of prisonersimmobilized--let alone one with a terrible knife wound in him. At theangle along which the knife had driven in and up below the ribs, anordinary man would have been dead in seconds. But it was very evidentnow that Maulbow was no ordinary man, and even after the eerie weaponshad been pitched out of the ship through the instrument room's disposaltube, Gefty couldn't rid himself of an uncomfortable suspicion that hewasn't done with Maulbow yet--wouldn't be done with him, in fact, untilone or the other of them was dead. He said to Kerim, "I thought the machine Maulbow set up in the storagevault would turn out to be some drive engine, but apparently it has anentirely different function. He connected it with the instruments he hadmade in the Hub, and together they form what he calls a control unit. The emergency panel would show if the unit were drawing juice from theship. It isn't, and I don't know what powers it. But we do know now thatthe control unit is holding us in the time current, and it will go onholding us there as long as it's in operation. "If we could shut it off, the _Queen_ would be 'rejected' by thecurrent, like Maulbow's sailer was. In other words, we'd get knockedback into normspace--which is what we want. And we want it to happen assoon as possible because, if Maulbow was telling the truth on thatpoint, every minute that passes here is taking us farther away from theHub, and farther from our own time towards his. " Kerim nodded, eyes intent on his face. "Now I can't just go down there and start slapping switches around onthe thing, " Gefty went on. "He said it wasn't working right, and even ifit were, I couldn't tell what would happen. But it doesn't seem toconnect up with any ship systems--it just seems to be holding us in afield of its own. So I should be able to move the whole unit into thecargo lock and eject it from there. If we shift the _Queen_ outside itsfield, that should have the same effect as shutting the control unitoff. It should throw us back into normspace. " Kerim nodded again. "What about Mr. Maulbow's janandra animal?" Gefty shrugged. "Depends on the mood I find it in. He said it wasn'tusually aggressive. Maybe it isn't. I'll get into a spacesuit forprotection and break out some of the mining equipment to move it alongwith. If I can maneuver it into an empty compartment where it will beout of the ... " * * * He broke off, expression changing, eyes fastened on the emergency panel. Then he turned hurriedly, reached across the side of the console for theintership airseal controls. Kerim asked apprehensively, "What's thematter, Gefty?" "Wish I knew ... Exactly. " Gefty indicated the emergency panel. "Littlered light there, on the storage deck section--it wasn't showing a minuteago. It means that the vault doors have been opened since then. " He saw the same half-superstitious fear appear in her face that hadtouched him. "You think _he_ did it?" "I don't know. " Maulbow's control of the guns had seemed uncanny enough. But that was a different matter. The guns were a product of his own timeand science. But the vault door mechanisms? There might have beensufficient opportunity for Maulbow to study them and alter them, forsome purpose of his own, since he'd come aboard.... "I've got the ship compartments and decks sealed off from each othernow, " Gefty said slowly. "The only connecting points from one to theother are personnel hatches--they're small air locks. So the janandra'sconfined to the storage deck. If it's come out of the vault, it might bea nuisance until I can get equipment to handle it. But that isn't tooserious. The spacesuits are on the second deck, and I'll get into onebefore I go on to the storage. You wait here a moment, I'll look in onMaulbow again before I start. " If Maulbow wasn't still unconscious, he was doing a good job of feigningit. Gefty looked at the pale, lax face, the half-shut eyes, shook hishead and left the cabin, locking it behind him. It mightn't be Maulbow'sdoing, but having the big snake loose in the storage could, in fact, make things extremely awkward now. He didn't think his gun would makemuch impression on anything of that size, and while several of theship's mining tools could be employed as very effective close-rangeweapons, they happened, unfortunately, to be stored away on the samedeck. He found Kerim standing in the center of the instrument room, waitingfor him. "Gefty, " she said, "do you notice anything? An odd sort of smell.... " Then the odor was in Gefty's nostrils, too, and the back of his neckturned to ice as he recognized it. He glanced up at the ventilationoutlet, looked back at Kerim. He took her arm, said softly, "Come this way. Keep very quiet! I don'tknow how it happened, but the janandra's on the main deck now. That'swhat it smells like. The smell's coming through the ventilation system, so the thing's moving around in the port section. We'll go the otherway. " Kerim whispered, "What will we do?" "Get ourselves into spacesuits first, and then get Maulbow's controlunit out of the ship. The janandra may be looking around for him. If itis, it won't bother us. " * * * * * He hadn't wanted to remind Kerim that, from what Maulbow said, theremight be more than one reason for getting rid of the control unit asquickly as possible. But it had been constantly in the back of his mind;and twice, in the few minutes that passed after Maulbow's strangeweapons were silenced, he had seen a momentary pale glare appear in theunquiet flow of darkness reflecting in the viewscreens. Gefty had saidnothing, because if it was true that hostile forces were alert andsearching for them here, it added to their immediate danger but not atall to the absolute need to free themselves from the inexorable rush ofthe Great Current before they were carried beyond hope of return totheir civilization. But those brief glimpses did add to the sense of urgency throbbing inGefty's nerves, while events, and the equally hard necessity to avoid afatally mistaken move in this welter of unknown factors, kept blockinghim. Now the mysterious manner in which Maulbow's unpleasant travelingcompanion had appeared on the main deck made it impossible to doanything but keep Kerim at his side. If Maulbow was still capable oftaking a hand in matters, there was no reasonably safe place to leaveher aboard the _Queen_. And Maulbow might be capable of it. Twice as they hurried up the narrow, angled passages along the _Queen's_ curving hull towards an airsealleading to the next compartment, Gefty caught a trace of theammonia-like animal odor coming over the ventilating system. Theyreached the lock without incident; but then, as they came along thesecond deck hall to the ship's magazine, there was a sharp click in thestillness behind them. Its meaning was disconcertingly apparent. Geftyhesitated, turned Kerim into a side passage, guided her along it. She looked up at his face. "It's following us?" "Seems to be. " No time for the spacesuits in the magazine now--somethinghad just emerged from the air lock through which they had entered thesecond deck not many moments before. He helped the girl quickly down asection of ladderlike stairs to the airseal connecting the second deckwith the storage, punched a wall button there. As the lock door opened, there was another noise from the passage they had just left, as ifsomething had thudded briefly and heavily against one of the bulkheads. Kerim uttered a little gasp. Then they were in the lock, and Geftyslapped down two other buttons, stood watching the door behind them snapshut and, a few seconds later, the one on the far side open on the darkstorage deck. They scrambled down another twelve feet of ladder to the floor of a sidepassage, hearing the lock snap shut behind them. As it closed, they werein complete darkness. Gefty seized Kerim's arm, ran with her up thepassage to the left, guiding himself with his fingertips on the leftbulkhead. When they came to a corner, he turned her to the left again. Afew seconds later, he pulled open a small door, bundled the girlthrough, came in himself, and shut the door to a narrow slit behindthem. Kerim whispered shakily, "What will we do now, Gefty?" "Stay here for the moment. It'll look for us in the vault first. " And it should go to the storage vault first where it had been guardingMaulbow's machine, to hunt for them there. But it might not. Gefty easedthe gun from his pocket on the far side of Kerim. Across the darkcompartment was another door. They could retreat a little farther hereif it became necessary--but not very much farther. They waited in a silence that was complete except for their unsteadybreathing and the distant, deep pulse of the _Queen's_ throttled-downdrives. He felt Kerim trembling against him. How did Maulbow's creaturemove through the airseal locks? The operating mechanisms were simple--adog might have been taught to use them. But a dog had paws.... There came the soft hiss of the opening lock, the faintest shimmer oflight to the right of the passage mouth he was watching through thedoor. A heavy thump on the floor below the locks followed, then a hardclick as the lock closed and complete darkness returned. The silence resumed. Seconds dragged on. Gefty's imagination picturedthe thing waiting, its great, wedge-shaped head raised as its sensesprobed the dark about it for a sign of the two human beings. Then avague rushing noise began, growing louder as it approached the passagemouth, crossing it, receding rapidly again to the left. Gefty let his breath out slowly, eased the door open and stood listeningagain. Abruptly, there was reflected light in the lock passage, comingnow from the left. He said in a whisper, "It's moving around in the mainhall, Kerim. We can go on the other way now, but we'll have to be fastand keep quiet. I've thought of how we can get rid of that thing. " * * * The cargo lock on the storage deck had two inner doors. The one whichopened into the side of the vault hall was built to allow passage of thelargest chunks of freight the _Queen_ was likely to be burdened with; itwas almost thirty feet wide and twenty high. The second door was justlarge enough to let a man in a spacesuit climb in and out of the side ofthe lock without using the freight door. It opened on a tiny controlcubicle from which the lock's mechanisms were operated during loadingprocesses. [Illustration] Gefty let Kerim and himself into the cubicle from one of the passages, steered the girl through the pitch blackness of the little room to thechair before the control panel and told her to sit down. He groped for amoment at the side of the panel, found a knob and twisted it. There wasa faint click. A scattering of pale lights appeared suddenly on thepanel, a dark viewscreen, set at a tilt above them, reflecting theirgleam. Gefty explained in a low voice, "Left side of that screen covers thelock. Right one covers the big hall outside. No lights in either at themoment, so you don't see anything. Only way the cargo door to the hallcan be opened or closed is with these switches right here. What I wantto do is get the janandra into the lock, slam the door on it and lockdown the control switches. Then we've got it trapped. " "But how are you going to get it to go in there?" "No real problem--I'll be three jumps ahead of it. Then I duck back upinto this cubicle, and lock both doors. And it'll be inside the lock. You have the picture now?" Kerim said unsteadily, "I do. But it sounds awfully risky, Gefty. " "Well, I don't like it either, " Gefty admitted. "So I'll start right nowbefore I lose my nerve. As soon as I move out into the vault hall, thelighting will go on. That's automatic. You watch the right side of thescreen. If you see the janandra coming before I do, yell as loud as youcan. " He shifted the two inner door switches to the right. A red sparkappeared in the dark viewscreen, high up near the center. A second redlight showed on the cubicle bulkhead beside Gefty. Beneath it an oblongsection of the bulkhead turned silently away on heavy hinges, became adoor two feet in thickness, which stood jutting out at a right angleinto the darkness of the cargo lock. A wave of cold air moved through itinto the control cubicle. On the screen, another red spark appeared beside the first one. "Both doors are open now, " Gefty murmured to the girl. "The janandraisn't in the vault hall or the lighting would have turned on, but it mayhave heard the door open and be on its way. So keep watching thescreen. " "I certainly will!" she whispered shakily. Gefty took an oversized wrench from the wall, climbed quickly andquietly down the three ladder steps to the floor of the lock, and walkedacross it to the sill of the giant freight door, which now had swung outand down into the vault hall, fitting itself into a depression of theflooring. He hesitated an instant on the sill, then stepped out into thebig dark hall. Light filled it immediately in both directions. He stood quiet, intent on the storage vault entrance far up the hall tohis left. He could see the vault was open. The janandra might still beinside it. But the seconds passed, and the dark entrance remained silentand there was no suggestion of motion beyond it. Gefty glanced to theright, moved a dozen steps farther out into the hall, hefted the wrenchand spun it through the air towards the ventilator frame on the oppositebulkhead. The heavy tool clanged loudly against the frame, bounced off and thuddedto the floor. Gefty started slowly over to it, heart pounding, with thevault entrance still at the edge of his vision. Kerim's voice screamed, "_Gefty, it's_--" He spun around, sprinted back to the cargo lock. The janandra had comesilently out of the nearest side passage behind him, was approachingwith the remembered oiling swiftness of motion, its great head lifted ayard from the floor. Gefty plunged through the lock, jumped for the topof the cubicle door steps, came stumbling into the cubicle. Kerim was onher feet, staring. He swung the cubicle door switch to the left, slapping it flat to the panel. The door snapped back into the wallbehind him with a force that shook the floor. On the screen, the janandra's thick, dark worm-shape was swinging aroundin the dim lock to regain the open hall. It had seen the trap. But thefreight door switch went flat beside the other, and the freight doorrose with massive swiftness. The heavy body smashed against it, wentsliding back to the floor as the door slammed shut and the screensection showing the cargo lock turned dark. "Got it--got it--got it!" Gefty heard himself whispering exultantly. Heswitched on the lock's interior lights. Then he swore softly, and, beside him, Kerim sucked in her breath. * * * * * The screen showed the janandra in violent but apparently purposefulmotion inside the lock ... And it was also apparent now that it was amore complexly constructed creature than the long worm-body and heavyhead had indicated. The skin, to a distance of some eight feet back ofthe head, had spread out into a wide, flexible frill. From beneath thefrill extended half a dozen jointed, bone-white arms, along with waving, ribbonlike appendages less easy to define. The thing was reared half upalong the hall door, inspecting its surface with these members; thensuddenly it flung itself around and flashed over to the outer lock door. Three arms shot out; wiry fingers caught the three spin-lockssimultaneously, began to whirl them. Gefty said, staring, "Kerim, it's going to ... " The janandra didn't. The motion checked suddenly, was reversed. Thelocks drew tight again. The janandra swung back from the door, liftinghalf its length upwards, big head weaving about as it inspected the toolracks overhead. An arm reached suddenly, snatched something from one ofthe racks. Then the thing turned again; and in the next instant its headfilled the viewscreen. Kerim made a choked sound of fright, jerking backagainst Gefty. The bulging, metal-green eyes seemed to stare directly athim. And the screen went black. Kerim whispered, "Wha ... What happened, Gefty?" Gefty swallowed, said, "It smashed the view pickup. Must have guessed wewere watching and didn't like it.... " He added, "I was beginning tothink Maulbow must be some kind of superman. But it wasn't anyremote-control magic of his that let the janandra out of the vault, andopened the intership locks when it came up to the main deck and followedus down again. It was doing all that for itself. It's Maulbow's partner, not his pet. And it's probably got at least as good a brain as anyoneelse on board behind that ugly face. " Kerim moistened her lips. "Can it ... Could it get out again?" "Into the ship?" Gefty shook his head decidedly. "Uh-uh. It could dumpitself out on the other side--and it almost did before it realized whereit was and what it was about to do. But the inner lock doors won't openuntil someone opens them right on this panel. No, the thing's safelytrapped. On the other hand ... " On the other hand, Gefty realized that he wouldn't now be able to bringhimself to eject the janandra out of the cargo lock and into the GreatCurrent. Its intentions obviously hadn't been friendly, but its level ofintelligence was as good as his own, and perhaps somewhat better; and atpresent it was helpless. To dispose of it as he'd had in mind wouldtherefore be the cold-blooded murder of an equal. But so long as thatugly and formidable shipmate of Maulbow's stayed in the cargo lock, thelock couldn't be used to get rid of the control unit in the vault. A new solution presented itself while Gefty was making a rapid andrather desperate mental review of various heavy-duty tools which mightbe employed as weapons to force the janandra into submission and haul itoff for confinement elsewhere in the ship. Not impossible, but a highlyprecarious and time-consuming operation at best. Then another thoughtoccurred: the storage vault lay directly against the hull of the_Queen_-- How long to cut through the hull? The ship's mining equipment was onboard, and the tools were self-powered. Climb into a spacesuit, emptythe air from the entire storage deck, leaving the janandra imprisoned inthe cargo lock ... With Maulbow incapacitated in sick bay, and Kerimback in the control compartment and also in a suit, for additionalprotection. Then cut ship's power to this deck to avoid complicationswith the _Queen's_ involved circuitry and work under spaceconditions--half an hour if he hurried. * * * "Shouldn't take more than another ten minutes, " he informed Kerimpresently over the suit's intercom. "I'm very glad to hear it, Gefty. " She sounded shaky. "Anything going on in the screens?" he asked. She hesitated a little, said, "No. Not at the moment. " Gefty grunted, blinked sweat from his eyes, and took hold of thehandgrips of the heavy mining cutter again, turning it nose down towardsthe vault floor. The guide light found the point he was working on, andthe slice beam stabbed out, began nibbling delicately away to extend thecurving line it had eaten through the _Queen's_ thick skin. He had drawna twenty-five foot circle around Maulbow's battered control unit and theinstruments attached to it, well outside the fragile-looking safetyfield. The circle was broken at four points where he would plantexplosives. The explosives, going off together, should shatter theconnecting links with the hull and throw the machine clear. If thatdidn't release them immediately from its influence, he would see whatputting the _Queen's_ drives into action would do. "Gefty?" Kerim's voice asked. "Uh-huh?" He could hear her swallow over the intercom. "Those lights are backnow. " "How many?" "Two, " Kerim said. "I _think_ they're only two. They keep crossing backand forth in front of us. " She laughed nervously. "It's idiotic, ofcourse, but I do get the feeling they're looking at us. " Gefty said hesitantly, "Everything's set but I need another minute ortwo to get this last connection whittled down a little more. If I blowthe charge too soon, it mightn't take the gadget clean out of the ship. " Kerim said, "I know. I'll just watch ... They just disappeared again. "Her voice changed. "Now there's something else. " "What's that?" "You know you said to watch the cargo lock lights on the emergencypanel. " "Yes. " "The outer lock door has just been opened. " "What!" "It must have been. The light started blinking red just now as I waslooking at it. " Gefty was silent a moment, his mind racing. Why would the janandra openthe lock? From what Maulbow had said, it could live for a while withoutair, but it still could gain nothing but eventual death from leaving theship-- Unless, Gefty thought, the janandra had become aware in some way that hewas about to blow their machine out of the _Queen_. There were grapplinglines in the cargo lock, and if four or five of those lines were slappedto the circular section of the hull he'd loosened ... "Kerim, " he said. "Yes?" "I'm going to blow the deal right now. Got your suit snapped to the wallbraces like I showed you?" "Yes, Gefty. " Her voice was faint but clear. He turned the cutter away from the line it had dug, sent it rolling offtowards the far wall. He hurried around the circle, checking the fourcharges, lumbered over to the vault passage, stopped just around thecorner. He took the firing box from his suit. "Ready, Kerim?" He opened the box. "Ready.... " "Here goes!" Gefty reached into the box, twisted the firing handle. Light flared in the vault. The deck shook below him. He came stumblingout from behind the wall. Maulbow's machine and its stand of instruments had vanished. Where ithad stood was a dark circular hole. Nothing else seemed to havehappened. Gefty clumped hurriedly over to the mining cutter, swung itaround, started more cautiously back towards the hole. He didn't havethe faintest idea what would come next, but a definite possibility wasthat he would see the janandra's dark form flowing up over the rim ofthe hole. Letting it run into the cutter beam might be the best way todiscourage it from re-entering the _Queen_. [Illustration] Instead, a dazzling brilliance suddenly blotted out everything. Thecutter was plucked from Gefty's grasp; then he was picked up, suit andall, and slammed up towards the vault ceiling. He had a feeling thatinaudible thunders were shaking the ship. He seemed to be rolling overand over along the ceiling. At last, the suit crashed into somethingwhich showed a total disinclination to yield, and Gefty blacked out. * * * * * The left side of his face felt pushed out of shape; his left eye wasn'tfunctioning too well, and there was a severe pulsing ache throughout thetop of his head. But Gefty felt happy. There were a few qualifying considerations. "Of course, " he pointed out to Kerim, "all we can really say immediatelyis that we're back in normspace and somewhere in the galaxy. " She smiled shakily. "Isn't that saying quite a lot, Gefty?" "It's something. " Gefty glanced around the instrument room. He hadplaced an emergency light on the console, but except for that, thecontrol compartment was in darkness. The renewed battering the _Queen_had absorbed had knocked out the power in the forward section. Theviewscreens were black, every instrument dead. But he'd seen the starsof normspace through the torn vault floor. It was something.... "We might have the light that slugged us to thank for that, " he said. "I'm not sure just what did happen there, but it could have beenMaulbow's control unit it was attacking rather than the ship. Maulbowsaid the lights were sensitive to the unit. At any rate, we're here, andwe're rid of the gadget--and of the janandra. " He hesitated. "I justdon't feel you should get your hopes too high. We may find out we're avery long way from the Hub. " Kerim's large eyes showed a degree of confidence which made him almostuncomfortable. "If we are, " she said serenely, "you'll get us backsomehow. " Gefty cleared his throat. "Well, we'll see. If the power shutoff issomething the _Queen's_ repair scanners can handle, the instruments willcome back on any minute. Give the scanners ten minutes. If they haven'tdone it by that time, they can't do it and I'll have to play repairman. Then, with the instruments working, we can determine exactly where weare. " Unless, he told himself silently, they'd wound up in a distant clusternever penetrated by the Federation's mapping teams. And there was theother little question of where they now were in time. But Kerim lookedrosy with relief, and those details could wait. He took up another emergency light, switched it on and said, "I'll seehow Maulbow is doing while we're waiting for power. If the first aidtreatment has pulled him through so far, the autosurgeon probably canfix him up. " Kerim's face suddenly took on a guilty expression. "I forgot all aboutMr. Maulbow!" She hesitated. "Should I come along?" Gefty shook his head. "I won't need help. And if it's a case for thesurgeon, you wouldn't like it. Those things work painlessly, but it getsto be a mess for a while. " He shut off the light again when he reached the sick bay which wasrunning on its independent power system. As he opened the cabin doorfrom the dispensary, carrying the autosurgeon, it became evident thatMaulbow was still alive but that he might be in delirium. Gefty placedthe surgeon on the table, went over to the bed and looked at Maulbow. To the extent that the emergency treatment instruments' cautiousrestraints permitted, Maulbow was twisting slowly about on the bed. Hewas speaking in a low, rapid voice, his face distorted by emotion. Thewords were not slurred, but they were in a language Gefty didn't know. It seemed clear that Maulbow had reverted mentally to his own time, andfor some seconds he remained unaware that Gefty had entered the room. Then, surprisingly, the slitted blue eyes opened wider and focused onGefty's face. And Maulbow screamed with rage. Gefty felt somewhat disconcerted. For the reason alone that he was underanesthetic, Maulbow should not have been conscious. But he was. Thewords were now ones Gefty could understand, and Maulbow was telling himthings which would have been interesting enough under differentcircumstances. Gefty broke in as soon as he could. "Look, " he said quietly, "I'm trying to help you. I ... " Maulbow interrupted him in turn, not at all quietly. Gefty listened amoment longer, then shrugged. So Maulbow didn't like him. He couldn'tsay honestly that he'd ever liked Maulbow much, and what he was hearingmade him like Maulbow considerably less. But he would keep the man fromthe future alive if he could. He positioned the autosurgeon behind the head of the bed to allow thedevice to begin its analysis, stood back at its controls where he couldboth follow the progress it made and watch Maulbow without exciting himfurther by remaining within his range of vision. After a moment, thesurgeon shut off the first-aid instruments and made unobtrusive use of aheavy tranquilizing drug. Then it waited. Maulbow should have lapsed into passive somnolence thirty secondsafterwards. But the drug seemed to produce no more effect on himmentally than the preceding anesthetic. He raged and screeched on. Geftywatched him uneasily, knowing now that he was looking at insanity. Therewas nothing more he could do at the moment--the autosurgeon's decisionswere safer than any nonprofessional's guesswork. And the surgeoncontinued to wait. Then, abruptly, Maulbow died. The taut body slumped against the bed andthe contorted features relaxed. The eyes remained half open; and whenGefty came around to the side of the bed, they still seemed to belooking up at him, but they no longer moved. A thin trickle of bloodstarted from the side of the slack mouth and stopped again. * * * The control compartment was still darkened and without power when Geftyreturned to it. He told Kerim briefly what had happened, added, "I'm notat all sure now he was even human. I'd rather believe he wasn't. " "Why that, Gefty?" She was studying his expression soberly. Gefty hesitated, said, "I thought at first he was furious because we'dupset his plans. But they weren't his plans ... They were thejanandra's. He wasn't exactly its servant. I suppose you'd have to sayhe was something like a pet animal. " Kerim said incredulously, "But that isn't possible! Think of howintelligently Mr. Maulbow ... " "He was following instructions, " Gefty said. "The janandra let him knowwhatever it wanted done. He was following instructions again when hetried to kill me after I'd got away from the thing in the vault. Thereal brain around here was the janandra ... And it was a real brain. With a little luck it would have had the ship. " Kerim smiled briefly. "You handled that big brain rather well, I think. " "I was the one who got lucky, " Gefty said. "Anyway, where Maulbow camefrom, it's the janandra's kind that gives the orders. And the thing is, Maulbow liked it that way. He didn't want it to be different. When thelight hit us, it killed the janandra on the outside of the ship. Maulbowfelt it happen and it cracked him up. He wanted to kill us for it. Butsince he was helpless, he killed himself. He didn't want to behealed--not by us. At least, that's what it looks like. " He shrugged, checked his watch, climbed out of the chair. "Well, " hesaid, "the ten minutes I gave the _Queen_ to turn the power back on areup. Looks like the old girl couldn't do it. So I'll--" The indirect lighting system in the instrument room went on silently. The emergency light flickered and went out. Gefty's head came around. Kerim was staring past him at the screens, her face radiant. "Oh, Gefty!" she cried softly. "Oh, Gefty! Our stars!" * * * * * "Green dot here is us, " Gefty explained, somewhat hoarsely. He clearedhis throat, went on, "Our true ship position, that is--" He stopped, realizing he was talking too much, almost babbling, in an attempt totake some of the tension out of the moment. The next few seconds mightnot tell them where they were, but it would show whether they had beencarried beyond the regions of space charted by Federation instruments. Which would mean the difference between having a chance--whether a goodchance or a bad one--of getting home eventually, and the alternative ofbeing hopelessly lost. There had been nothing recognizably familiar about the brilliantly densestar patterns in the viewscreens, but he gave no further thought tothat. Unless the ship's exact position was known or one was on anestablished route, it was a waste of time looking for landmarks in asizable cluster. He turned on the basic star chart. Within the locator plate the greenpinpoint of light reappeared, red-ringed and suspended now against thethree-dimensional immensities of the Milky Way. It stayed still amoment, began a smooth drift towards Galactic East. Gefty let his breathout carefully. He sensed Kerim's eyes on him but kept his gaze fixed onthe locator plate. The green dot slowed, came to a stop. Gefty's finger tapped the samebutton four times. The big chart flicked out of existence, and in theplate three regional star maps appeared and vanished in quick successionbehind it. The fourth map stayed. For a few seconds, the red-circledgreen spark was not visible here. Then it showed at the eastern marginof the map, came gliding forwards and to the left, slowed again andheld steady. Now the star map began to glide through the locator plate, carrying the fixed green dot with it. It brought the dot up to deadcenter point in the locator plate and stopped. Gefty slumped a little. He rubbed his hands slowly down his face andmuttered a few words. Then he shook his head. "Gefty, " Kerim whispered, "what is it? Where are we?" Gefty looked at her. "After we got hauled into that time current, " he said hoarsely, "I triedto find out which way in space we were headed. The direction indicatorsover there seemed to show we were trying to go everywhere at once. Youremember Maulbow's control unit wasn't working right, neededadjustments. Well, all those little impulses must have pretty wellcanceled out because we weren't taken really far. In the last hour and ahalf we've covered roughly the distance the _Queen_ could have gone onher own in, say, thirty days. " "Then where ... " "Home, " Gefty said simply. "It's ridiculous! Other side of the Hub fromwhere we started. " He nodded at the plate. "Eastern Hub Quadrant. Section Six Eight. The G2 behind the green dot--that's the Evaleesystem. We could be putting down at Evalee Interstellar three hours fromnow if we wanted to. " Kerim was laughing and crying together. "Oh, Gefty! I knew you would ... " "A fat lot I had to do with it!" Gefty leaned forward suddenly, switchedon the transmitter. "And now let's pick up a live newscast. There'ssomething else I ... " His voice trailed off. The transmitter screen lit up with a blurredjumble of print, colors, a muttering of voices, music and noises. Geftytwisted a dial. The screen cleared, showed a newscast headline sheet. Gefty blinked at it, glanced sideways at Kerim, grimaced. "The something else, " he said, his voice a little strained, "wassomething I was also worried about. Looks like I was more or lessright. " "Why, what's wrong?" "Nothing really bad, " Gefty assured her. He added, "I think. But take alook at the Federation dateline. " Kerim peered at the screen, frowned. "But ... " "Uh-huh. " "Why, that ... That's almost ... " "That, " Gefty said, "or rather _this_ is the day after we started outfrom the Hub, headed roughly Galactic west. Three weeks ago. We'd bejust past Miam. " He knuckled his chin. "Interesting thought, isn't it?" Kerim was silent for long seconds. "Then they ... Or we ... " "Oh, they're us, all right, " Gefty said. "They'd have to be, wouldn'tthey?" "I suppose so. It seems a little confusing. But I was thinking. If yousend them a transmitter call ... " Gefty shook his head. "The _Queen's_ transmitter isn't too hot, but itmight push a call as far as Evalee. Then we could arrange for a Com-Weblink-up there, and in another ten minutes or so ... But I don't thinkwe'd better. " "Why not?" Kerim demanded. "Because we got through it all safely, so we're going to get through itsafely. But if we receive that message now and never go on to Maulbow'smoon ... You see? There's no way of knowing just what would happen. " Kerim looked hesitant, frowned. "I suppose you're right, " she agreedreluctantly at last. "So Mr. Maulbow will have to stay dead now. Andthat janandra. " After a moment she added pensively, "Of course, theyweren't really very nice--" Gefty shivered. One of the things he'd learned from Maulbow's ravingswas the real reason he and Kerim had been taken along on the trip. Hedidn't feel like telling Kerim about it just yet, but it had been solelybecause of Maulbow's concern for his master's creature comforts. Thejanandra could go for a long time without food, but after fasting forseveral years on the moon, a couple of snacks on the homeward run wouldhave been highly welcome. And the janandra was a gourmet. It much preferred, as Maulbow well knew, to have its snacks still wriggling-fresh as it started them down itsgullet. "No, " Gefty said, "I couldn't call either of them really nice. " Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from _Analog_ September 1962. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U. S. Copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.